Information technology improvement is the top priority of government lending programs in the coming months and into 2019. Agency representatives at the Mortgage Bankers Association’s annual convention in Washington, DC, said policy changes are in the works to enhance and improve operations, compliance and customer service. FHA Commissioner Brian Montgomery, who joined the agency four months ago, said IT modernization is his primary concern. A state-of-the-art IT system and advanced data analytics are needed to manage FHA exposures effectively, he said. Montgomery made clear FHA has no plans to build a proprietary system but is considering the idea of shared technology, possibly with VA and USDA; something based on Fannie Mae’s and Freddie Mac’s systems; or some off-the-shelf software. In his view, a modern IT system would have automated underwriting that provides ...

Ginnie Mae has made considerable progress in dealing with rapid prepayments on VA loans but prepayment speeds on Ginnie mortgage-backed securities in general continue to annoy investors. Prepay speeds on Ginnie MBS are now at the lowest since 2014 but it is not enough for agency Executive Vice President Maren Kasper to feel confident as she addressed the annual convention of the Mortgage Bankers Association this week. “Our prepayment issue is not solved,” said Kasper, as she spoke on a panel with representatives of government-lending programs. The agency continues to hear from investors about the problem, she said. Kasper cited two instances where Ginnie officials were summoned to meetings in China and New York to explain the prepayments to irate investors. They threatened to stop purchasing Ginnie bonds, she said. Kasper declined to say how bad the ...

Community mortgage lenders are asking the U.S. Senate to consider with caution before voting on legislative language passed recently by the House of Representatives to address “orphan” VA streamline refinance loans. Specifically, the Community Mortgage Lenders of America asked the Senate to step back and allow some time for substitute language to be presented with input from the industry and the Department of Veterans Affairs. At issue is the wording in H.R. 6737, the Protect Affordable Mortgages for Veterans Act of 2018. The bill fixes a technical issue that prevented VA lenders from pooling certain VA Interest Rate Reduction Refinance Loans in Ginnie Mae mortgage-backed securities pools. Approximately 2,500 VA refi loans were affected by an inconsistency between the loan seasoning guidelines issued by Ginnie in late 2016 and provisions in the ...

Fun fact: Nonbanks went over the 60.0 percent threshold in Ginnie Mae market share during the third quarter.

The three rating services noted the unique treatment of unpaid interest in their presale reports…

The agency mortgage-servicing market continued to grow at a steady pace during the third quarter of 2018, fueled by strong purchase-mortgage originations, according to an exclusive ranking and analysis by Inside Mortgage Finance. [Includes two data charts.]

As part of a multi-year language access plan, the Federal Housing Finance Agency and the government-sponsored enterprises this week introduced the first phase of a mortgage translation clearinghouse to better serve Spanish-speaking borrowers.

An affiliate of Annaly Capital Management is preparing to issue a $384 million mortgage-backed security stocked with non-qualified mortgages and loans for investment properties…

The three major credit reporting bureaus – Experian, Equifax and TransUnion – continued to rank first, second and third, respectively, in the number of complaints filed…

As IMFnews went to press, multiple telephone messages and emails to 360 Mortgage had not been returned.